Lori Lynne Armstrong, Writer

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Peanut Gallery

My feature reading is tomorrow night. I’ve enjoyed preparing for it. I have also spent some quality time listening to the peanut gallery of my insecurities. Twenty-five minutes seems like a long time, although I know from other public speaking experience that it will probably fly by.

Beyond the normal insecurities one might have about public speaking, however, are a set of insecurities more specific to the type of sharing I’ll be doing. Here, in the spirit of putting honesty before pride, are some of them:

–I arrive and find that the audience is a fraction of its usual size because of the inauguration and the protest marches. This one has some practical basis, but there’s nothing I can do about it. It will be what it is.

–The audience, of whatever size, is disappointed that only a small amount of my poetry immediately relates to current events. They judge my work as self-involved and frivolous.

–The audience is baffled by the wide range of topics my poetry spans. They judge me to be without a unifying vision.

–The audience discounts anything I have to say because I am at the higher end of my weight range and don’t fit their picture of what a poet looks like.

–The audience sneers at the hints of spirituality present in some of my poems. I am written off as a kook rather than a serious poet.

–The audience is repulsed by the personal things they learn about me through hearing a wider variety of my work, and their view of me is now altered by prejudice and misconception.

There is a sample. The thoughts range from reasonable to ridiculous, but they are mine and deserve acknowledgement. Here’s the good news, though–I have faith that none of these insecurities are going to stop me from enjoying myself. I have another persona that emerges at times like this. It’s authentic, but is somehow able to place hesitation aside. The insecurities will probably come back when I’m done…but when I’m up there, it’s going to feel amazing.